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Cinema Verde Newsletter April 2025

Check out these Cinema Verde films and more!

We are delighted to announce that we have selected 45 new films to be presented in our 2025 Cinema Verde film festival! As we celebrate the selection of this year’s films, we also face turbulent times. Like so many others in the environmental justice field, we face an uncertain future. We are a team of committed volunteers working eagerly toward a festival to be held in 2025. As an independent nonprofit, we're currently facing a shortage of funding and support, and we need a community more than ever. If Cinema Verde has inspired you, informed you, or sparked your curiosity, we invite you to contribute. Your support—big or small—can bring these stories to life. At this time we are working to produce Cinema Verde 2025 a virtual festival and we hope to open on Earth Day, April 22. We also hope to present some of our official selections in person in the coming year. Please stay tuned for details. Donation Page Featured Films: Now Playing Explore the Cinema Verde channel for a selection of thought-provoking films like the ones below—and so many more! Dive into powerful stories that inspire change and raise awareness about our planet's future. Cinema Verde Channel Mayday Terranean Mayday Terranean is a documentary film portraying the problems of the Mediterranean Sea as well as the beauty it still has to offer. Scientists, conservationists and activists from countries around the Mediterranean Sea talk about the topic, their relationship to ocean conservation and shed light on the story of this wonderful but endangered place. Watch Trailer TUPUNGATO - empathy In Death Tupungato - empathy in death, follows Rafael Pease’s six year obsession of visibilizing a threatened area. A winter expedition to the highest peak, Volcano Tupungato 21,555ft, evolves into a fight for conservation. In hopes of creating a national park, containing 340,000 acres in one of the worlds biodiversity hotspots, as well as a significant source of water for 40% of Chile’s population. Interviews with renowned scientists and activists unveil a web of corruption in the government and multinational corporations, stemming from imperial religion and a dictators constitution. This explosive film is set against the backdrop of historic protests, as the people of Chile rise up for social and environmental rights. Watch Trailer Confessions of An Ecoterrorist A feature length documentary film. A unique look at eco-history from one who was there for 40 years: Peter Jay Brown, and a humorous examination of the word “eco-terrorist” in today’s reality. Watch Trailer Get Involved Today! We’re currently seeking sponsors, partners, advertisers, and small businesses to collaborate with! Fill out the form below to place an ad on our Roku channel and support our mission of showcasing powerful films that inspire action toward a more sustainable world. Let’s work together to create lasting impact. Contact us Copyright (C) * 2025 All rights reserved *

Documentary
Nature
Crisis

When sadness strikes I remember I’m not alone in loving the wild boundless beauty of the living world | Georgina Woods

Nature will reclaim its place as a terrifying quasi-divine force that cannot be mastered. I find this strangely comfortingExplore the series – Last chance: the extinction crisis being ignored this electionGet Guardian Australia environment editor Adam Morton’s Clear Air column as an emailAt times my work takes me to the big city and the tall buildings where people with power make decisions that affect the rest of us. While I am there, crossing busy roads, wearing tidy clothes and carrying out my duty, I think of faraway places where life is getting on without me.Logrunners are turning leaf litter on the rainforest floor, albatross are cruising the wind beyond sight of the coast. Why does thinking about these creatures, who have no idea that I exist, bring me such comfort?Get Guardian Australia environment editor Adam Morton’s Clear Air column as an email Continue reading...

At times my work takes me to the big city and the tall buildings where people with power make decisions that affect the rest of us. While I am there, crossing busy roads, wearing tidy clothes and carrying out my duty, I think of faraway places where life is getting on without me.Logrunners are turning leaf litter on the rainforest floor, albatross are cruising the wind beyond sight of the coast. Why does thinking about these creatures, who have no idea that I exist, bring me such comfort?Because they are free, because they are beautiful, and because of their utter indifference to me.Last chance: the extinction crisis this election is ignoring (series trailer) – videoI was in a pub in Newcastle a few weeks ago chatting to a stranger with a lot going on. He runs a business selling household appliances, employs dozens of people, is negotiating a divorce and paying a mortgage. He seemed sceptical about what people tell him about climate change. Given how much else he has to think about, that didn’t surprise me. I asked him, if he was free next week to do anything he wanted, what would he do? He said he would bundle his kids into a van and drive to Seal Rocks to go camping.If you’re not familiar with it, Seal Rocks is among the most beautiful places anywhere on the New South Wales coast. I’d love to be there next week myself.People seek and find freedom in wild places. There is toil in the rest of the natural world and there are dependants to care for, as there are in civilisation, but there is also a sense of boundlessness.This feeling catches me up and I get carried away. I want to cruise in the great ocean currents like a tuna. I want to gather grass and spider silk and nest in the shrubs with the wrens. I suspect the tug of freedom is what takes some people out on hunting trips, and some to earn their living as jackaroos or prawners.Then there is the beauty. Survival is necessary but being gorgeous, creative and excessive has played as important a role in evolution as survival skills. This has filled the world with the resplendent detail of iridescent insects, curly liverworts, currawong song and the synchronised courtship flight-dance of terns.And it is not just living creatures making this beauty. Rays of sunlight bend through a running creek and make bright moving patterns of line and form on its bedrock. All beings have the urge to expression, even including non-living beings: rivers have it, waves have it, the wind. The wind heaps sand in rhythmic curls in the desert.The freedom and beauty of nature guide my sense of right and wrong. If I am to be free, I must care for the freedom of other earthlings. Beauty is the signal to me that this is true.skip past newsletter promotionSign up to Clear Air AustraliaAdam Morton brings you incisive analysis about the politics and impact of the climate crisisPrivacy Notice: Newsletters may contain info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. For more information see our Privacy Policy. We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.after newsletter promotionWhen self-consciousness traps me in its hall of mirrors, the outside world brings the relief of being unimportant. A friend and I once sat by a creek in a rainforest. A rose robin flew down to drink beside us, unaware we were there. The marvellous world is turning without me and my own life is as dear, marvellous, fleeting and irrelevant as a rose robin’s. What lightness!People talk about cosmic vertigo but how about the giddiness of knowing that the ancestors of the lyrebird you’re listening to have been living in the forests of this continent for 15m years, since there were still trees in Antarctica?We’re living in a thin film of biosphere that is creating its own atmosphere, recycling its own wastes, cleaning its own water, producing and metabolising in complex self-organising systems that we are too small and silly to understand.When we talk about “protecting nature” it makes sense at a certain scale but it is quaintly hubristic. Nature is not all lovely creatures and majestic landscapes. It is mutating viruses, poleward-creeping cyclones and vengeful orcas. Just who needs looking after from whom?Now that greenhouse pollution and the global environmental cataclysms of the last hundred years have broken long-familiar patterns of living within the biosphere, nature will reclaim its place as a terrifying quasi-divine force that cannot be mastered. This, too, is strangely comforting.I often feel overwhelmed with sadness to be living in a culture that doesn’t seem to value all of this but I know that I am not alone in loving the living world.The Biodiversity Council of Australia takes the trouble to ask people how they feel about nature, why and how it is important to them. The overwhelming majority of people feel as I do: that they are part of nature (69%); that being in nature helps them deal with everyday stress (79%); that it is important to them to know that nature is being looked after (88%). The vast majority want more to be done to protect it (96%). The way Australian politics treats “the environment” – either as a decorative irrelevance or as an insidious threat to our prosperity – doesn’t reflect the way the people feel about it.Love and affinity for nature cuts across political, social and economic divisions. Of course, if you ask someone to choose between their own livelihood and the livelihood of a greater glider or a Maugean skate, they’re likely to choose their own – even more so for the non-specific thing they call “net zero”. But why should anyone be asked to make that kind of awful choice?Nature shows me that we don’t have to choose between beauty and freedom on the one hand, and good living on the other. Australians’ desire to be part of and safeguard the living world is a good start but we’re going to lose so much of it unless we take some responsibility for what we’re doing.

Crisis
Extinction
Forests

A high-flying visitor – the wondrous far eastern curlew – faces fresh threat in NT wetlands haven

Guardian Australia is highlighting the plight of our endangered native species during an election campaign that is ignoring broken environment laws and rapidly declining ecosystemsExplore the series – Last chance: the extinction crisis being ignored this electionGet Guardian Australia environment editor Adam Morton’s Clear Air column as an emailHundreds of far eastern curlews fly non-stop more than 10,000km every year to Darwin Harbour from Russia and China. But their southern habitat is under threat from a large industrial development backed by more than $1bn in federal government funding.Known for its long curved bill and soft brown feathers, the far eastern curlew is the world’s largest migratory shorebird and one of 22 priority bird species the Albanese government has promised to support. The birds fly south each year to forage, rest and fatten up during summer before returning to the northern hemisphere.Get Guardian Australia environment editor Adam Morton’s Clear Air column as an email Continue reading...

Hundreds of far eastern curlews fly non-stop more than 10,000km every year to Darwin Harbour from Russia and China. But their southern habitat is under threat from a large industrial development backed by more than $1bn in federal government funding.Known for its long curved bill and soft brown feathers, the far eastern curlew is the world’s largest migratory shorebird and one of 22 priority bird species the Albanese government has promised to support. The birds fly south each year to forage, rest and fatten up during summer before returning to the northern hemisphere.Register: it’s quick and easyIt’s still free to read – this is not a paywallWe’re committed to keeping our quality reporting open. By registering and providing us with insight into your preferences, you’re helping us to engage with you more deeply, and that allows us to keep our journalism free for all.Have a subscription? Made a contribution? Already registered?Sign InFar eastern curlews are a marvel in the natural world and affectionately described as the ultimate endurance athletes. Unable to glide, soar or land on the ocean, they flap their wings for the entirety of their journeys until they reach safe and familiar coastal habitat thousands of kilometres away.Will the curlew be able to hang on despite habitat loss? Illustration: Meeri AnneliThe curlew’s global population has fallen by 80% over the past 40 years, largely due to destruction and development-related changes to its intertidal habitat.Government documents show the proposed industrial precinct at Middle Arm, on a peninsula 13km south of Darwin, will need about 1,500 hectares (3,705 acres) of native mangroves and savanna woodland to be cleared, affecting “threatened species, and sensitive and significant vegetation”.The precinct is a proposed Northern Territory government development involving the construction of wharves and jetties to be used by industries including liquified natural gas, carbon capture and storage and critical minerals.The former NT Labor government was criticised for promoting it as a “sustainable” development despite documents revealing officials considered it a “key enabler” for a large gas industry expansion.Much of the public scrutiny of the project has focused on its potential contribution to the climate crisis and whether $1.5bn in federal support backed by Labor and the Coalition is effectively a fossil fuel subsidy.But a preliminary assessment by the NT government shows the project would cause significant damage to local wildlife.It would include the “loss of key high tide roosting habitats” for the far eastern curlew and the endangered bar-tailed godwit – another migratory species – as saltpans and mangroves were cleared and reclaimed. Far eastern curlews rely on these areas for foraging and roosting.Dr Amanda Lilleyman, a shorebird expert and BirdLife Top End volunteer based in Darwin, said the Middle Arm development’s potential impact on the species was concerning and consistent with the loss of its coastal habitat around the world. “This has been the direct cause of the population declines over the last 40 years,” she said.Far eastern curlews have ‘been hammered by habitat destruction up and down the entire flyway for the past 40 years’, one expert says. Photograph: Manoj Kutty Padeettathil ManilalThe far eastern curlew is also likely to be harmed by land clearing under way for a defence housing project at Lee Point, north of Darwin, where the birds feed and rest.The federal environment minister, Tanya Plibersek, last year rejected a proposed apartment and marina development at Toondah Harbour in Queensland’s Moreton Bay because of its impact on an internationally significant wetland used by far eastern curlews and other endangered migratory species.Toondah Harbour was designated worthy of protection under the Ramsar convention, a global treaty covering wetlands. The salt pans and intertidal zones of Darwin Harbour are not subject to the treaty. But Lilleyman said they still needed protection.skip past newsletter promotionSign up to Clear Air AustraliaAdam Morton brings you incisive analysis about the politics and impact of the climate crisisPrivacy Notice: Newsletters may contain info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. For more information see our Privacy Policy. We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.after newsletter promotionShe said the curlew’s survival required all governments of countries within its east Asian-Australasian flyway to act.“The survival of threatened migratory species is dependent on the sum of all of those habitat parts,” she said. “If all of the important habitat is protected then you’re starting to get on track for reversing the decline of the species.”Sean Dooley, a senior adviser at BirdLife Australia, said far eastern curlews had “been hammered by habitat destruction up and down the entire flyway for the past 40 years”.He said Australia’s national environmental law, the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act, was “failing the species badly” because it did not factor in cumulative impacts of habitat loss in different places.Dooley said damage from numerous developments added up to a “serious blow to the viability of the population”. “The idea that they can always just go somewhere else just doesn’t stack up any more and every remaining suitable habitat becomes even more precious,” he said.The NT minister for logistics and infrastructure, Bill Yan, said an environment assessment was being done but the Country Liberal party government was “committed to rebuilding the economy through the development of the Middle Arm precinct”.He said the assessment was identifying “the potential cumulative impacts of the precinct on environmental values and developing ways to protect them”, and it was inappropriate to draw conclusions before it was complete.Dooley said protecting remaining far eastern curlew habitat would be “an act of hope for the future” that the species can be not just saved but could “return and recover”.“The wonder of the curlew’s migration unites cultures across the flyway, their annual return a potent symbol of hope and renewal,” he said. “To consent to further habitat destruction obliterates that hope of a rich and balanced future.”

Crisis
Government
Conservation

Virginia court delays state’s return to carbon market as Youngkin fights ruling

A Virginia judge has paused the state’s court-ordered return to the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI) while Gov. Glenn Youngkin appeals the decision, delaying millions in climate and flood-preparedness funding.Charles Paullin reports for Inside Climate News.In short:A Floyd County judge ruled Virginia does not have to rejoin RGGI while Youngkin's appeal proceeds, extending the legal battle potentially for years.RGGI had generated about $830 million for Virginia since 2021, with funds directed toward energy efficiency and flood preparedness programs.Environmental groups argue Youngkin's withdrawal was illegal and has already led to increased emissions and lost funding for clean energy initiatives.Key quote:“Unfortunately, we also know that Helene will not be the last disaster we face in Virginia.”— Emily Steinhilber, Environmental Defense FundWhy this matters:RGGI is a multi-state effort to cut carbon emissions by requiring power producers to buy pollution allowances, with proceeds funding climate resilience projects. Virginia’s withdrawal has already led to higher emissions and halted funding for flood preparedness. With severe weather becoming more frequent, the loss of these funds could leave vulnerable communities unprotected. Youngkin’s opposition — calling RGGI a "tax" — puts the program’s future at risk, especially as the state’s leadership may change following upcoming elections.Related: Virginia Democrats push to rejoin carbon market as Youngkin seeks disaster relief fund

A Virginia judge has paused the state’s court-ordered return to the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI) while Gov. Glenn Youngkin appeals the decision, delaying millions in climate and flood-preparedness funding.Charles Paullin reports for Inside Climate News.In short:A Floyd County judge ruled Virginia does not have to rejoin RGGI while Youngkin's appeal proceeds, extending the legal battle potentially for years.RGGI had generated about $830 million for Virginia since 2021, with funds directed toward energy efficiency and flood preparedness programs.Environmental groups argue Youngkin's withdrawal was illegal and has already led to increased emissions and lost funding for clean energy initiatives.Key quote:“Unfortunately, we also know that Helene will not be the last disaster we face in Virginia.”— Emily Steinhilber, Environmental Defense FundWhy this matters:RGGI is a multi-state effort to cut carbon emissions by requiring power producers to buy pollution allowances, with proceeds funding climate resilience projects. Virginia’s withdrawal has already led to higher emissions and halted funding for flood preparedness. With severe weather becoming more frequent, the loss of these funds could leave vulnerable communities unprotected. Youngkin’s opposition — calling RGGI a "tax" — puts the program’s future at risk, especially as the state’s leadership may change following upcoming elections.Related: Virginia Democrats push to rejoin carbon market as Youngkin seeks disaster relief fund

Climate
Energy
Pollution

Two years into his term, has Gov. Shapiro kept his promises to regulate Pennsylvania’s fracking industry?

PITTSBURGH — Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro ran on a promise to regulate Pennsylvania’s oil and gas industry more stringently. Two years into his term, the Environmental Health Project, a public health advocacy nonprofit focused on fracking, has published a report that assesses the Shapiro administration’s progress. “Despite some steps in the right direction, we are still missing the boat on actions that can improve our economic, environmental, and health outcomes,” Alison L. Steele, executive director of the Environmental Health Project, said during a press conference. As attorney general, Shapiro spearheaded a 2020 grand jury report that concluded, in his words, that “when it comes to fracking, Pennsylvania failed” in its “duty to set, and enforce, ground rules that protect public health and safety.” During his campaign for governor in 2022, Shapiro said that if elected, he would implement the eight recommendations made by that grand jury, which included expanding no-drill zones from 500 to 2,500 feet from homes, requiring fracking companies to publicly disclose all chemicals used in wells before they’re drilled, and providing a “comprehensive health response” to the effects of living near fracking sites, among other measures. Some progress has been made on enacting those recommendations, Steele said, but “there are more opportunities available to Gov. Shapiro over the next two years of his term.” The report applauds the Shapiro administration’s progress on some environmental health measures “despite increasing challenges at the federal level,” including identifying and plugging 300 abandoned oil and gas wells, promoting renewable energy projects, and proposing alternatives to the state’s stalled participation in the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI). But the report also says the Shapiro administration has fallen short on regulating the oil and gas industry to reduce health risks, prioritizing clean energy that doesn’t include fossil fuels, and fully supporting a just transition to renewable energy.The Shapiro administration has yet to expand no-drill zones in Pennsylvania from the required 500 feet to 2,500 feet, still doesn’t require fracking companies to publicly disclose all chemicals used in fracking, and has failed to acknowledge the science on health risks of exposure to shale gas pollution, according to the report. The report also says that, despite positive efforts to advance environmental justice, agencies like the Pennsylvania Department of Health and Department of Environmental Protection are not engaging enough with frontline communities and health care providers in fracking communities, and that the Department of Environmental Protection needs additional funding to enforce existing environmental regulations. While the Shapiro administration was able to obtain a 14% increase in funding for the Department of Environmental Protection in the 2024-2025 budget, “the bulk of the 2024-2025 funding was earmarked for staff in the permitting division, not the enforcement division, where a real regulatory need exists,” according to the report. Shapiro called for an additional 12% increase in funding for the agency in the 2025-2026 budget, but details about how those funds would be allocated have not yet been released. The report makes the following recommendations for the Shapiro administration: Urge the General Assembly to amend Act 13 and mandate greater distances between homes, schools, hospitals, and fracking sites.Press the legislature to require full disclosure of all chemicals used in fracking wells, even if they are considered proprietary or a trade secret.Develop a comprehensive health plan for preventing fossil fuel pollution exposureAddress cumulative emissions when permitting fracking sites.Further increase funding for the Department of Environmental Protection and the Department of Health.Call on the state’s departments of health and environmental protection to work more closely and transparently with communities.Take a precautionary approach to petrochemicals, blue hydrogen, and liquified natural gas.Transition away from fossil fuels and toward renewable forms of energy. Steele acknowledged that some of the recommendations, including increasing the distance between wells and homes, would require new legislation. The Republican-controlled state senate vocally opposes any new regulations for the oil and gas industry, limiting what the Shapiro administration can achieve. “In those cases,” Steele said, “he could at least use his authority to vocally encourage legislative action.” Pennsylvania state Rep. Dr. Arvind Venkat, an emergency physician who represents parts of western Pennsylvania, said these recommendations are timely as federal environmental protections are being rolled back under the Trump administration. “What we're seeing out of DC is as extreme an attack on environmental regulation and the scientific understanding of the relationship between the environment and health as I've seen in my lifetime,”Venkat said during the press conference. “Both parties are pushing more things down to the state and local level, so as bad as this is…it creates an opportunity for us to be far more responsible than we have been at the state level.”Editor’s note: The Environmental Health Project and Environmental Health News both receive funding from the Heinz Endowments.

PITTSBURGH — Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro ran on a promise to regulate Pennsylvania’s oil and gas industry more stringently. Two years into his term, the Environmental Health Project, a public health advocacy nonprofit focused on fracking, has published a report that assesses the Shapiro administration’s progress. “Despite some steps in the right direction, we are still missing the boat on actions that can improve our economic, environmental, and health outcomes,” Alison L. Steele, executive director of the Environmental Health Project, said during a press conference. As attorney general, Shapiro spearheaded a 2020 grand jury report that concluded, in his words, that “when it comes to fracking, Pennsylvania failed” in its “duty to set, and enforce, ground rules that protect public health and safety.” During his campaign for governor in 2022, Shapiro said that if elected, he would implement the eight recommendations made by that grand jury, which included expanding no-drill zones from 500 to 2,500 feet from homes, requiring fracking companies to publicly disclose all chemicals used in wells before they’re drilled, and providing a “comprehensive health response” to the effects of living near fracking sites, among other measures. Some progress has been made on enacting those recommendations, Steele said, but “there are more opportunities available to Gov. Shapiro over the next two years of his term.” The report applauds the Shapiro administration’s progress on some environmental health measures “despite increasing challenges at the federal level,” including identifying and plugging 300 abandoned oil and gas wells, promoting renewable energy projects, and proposing alternatives to the state’s stalled participation in the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI). But the report also says the Shapiro administration has fallen short on regulating the oil and gas industry to reduce health risks, prioritizing clean energy that doesn’t include fossil fuels, and fully supporting a just transition to renewable energy.The Shapiro administration has yet to expand no-drill zones in Pennsylvania from the required 500 feet to 2,500 feet, still doesn’t require fracking companies to publicly disclose all chemicals used in fracking, and has failed to acknowledge the science on health risks of exposure to shale gas pollution, according to the report. The report also says that, despite positive efforts to advance environmental justice, agencies like the Pennsylvania Department of Health and Department of Environmental Protection are not engaging enough with frontline communities and health care providers in fracking communities, and that the Department of Environmental Protection needs additional funding to enforce existing environmental regulations. While the Shapiro administration was able to obtain a 14% increase in funding for the Department of Environmental Protection in the 2024-2025 budget, “the bulk of the 2024-2025 funding was earmarked for staff in the permitting division, not the enforcement division, where a real regulatory need exists,” according to the report. Shapiro called for an additional 12% increase in funding for the agency in the 2025-2026 budget, but details about how those funds would be allocated have not yet been released. The report makes the following recommendations for the Shapiro administration: Urge the General Assembly to amend Act 13 and mandate greater distances between homes, schools, hospitals, and fracking sites.Press the legislature to require full disclosure of all chemicals used in fracking wells, even if they are considered proprietary or a trade secret.Develop a comprehensive health plan for preventing fossil fuel pollution exposureAddress cumulative emissions when permitting fracking sites.Further increase funding for the Department of Environmental Protection and the Department of Health.Call on the state’s departments of health and environmental protection to work more closely and transparently with communities.Take a precautionary approach to petrochemicals, blue hydrogen, and liquified natural gas.Transition away from fossil fuels and toward renewable forms of energy. Steele acknowledged that some of the recommendations, including increasing the distance between wells and homes, would require new legislation. The Republican-controlled state senate vocally opposes any new regulations for the oil and gas industry, limiting what the Shapiro administration can achieve. “In those cases,” Steele said, “he could at least use his authority to vocally encourage legislative action.” Pennsylvania state Rep. Dr. Arvind Venkat, an emergency physician who represents parts of western Pennsylvania, said these recommendations are timely as federal environmental protections are being rolled back under the Trump administration. “What we're seeing out of DC is as extreme an attack on environmental regulation and the scientific understanding of the relationship between the environment and health as I've seen in my lifetime,”Venkat said during the press conference. “Both parties are pushing more things down to the state and local level, so as bad as this is…it creates an opportunity for us to be far more responsible than we have been at the state level.”Editor’s note: The Environmental Health Project and Environmental Health News both receive funding from the Heinz Endowments.

Chemicals
Energy
Health

Cargo ship captain arrested after North Sea collision raises environmental concerns

Authorities arrested the captain of the cargo ship Solong after a fatal North Sea collision led to a jet fuel spill, raising alarms about marine pollution.Robyn Vinter, Josh Halliday, and Karen McVeigh report for The Guardian.In short:The Solong collided with the Stena Immaculate, which was carrying 220,000 barrels of jet fuel for the U.S. Air Force; at least one tank is leaking into the North Sea.Authorities arrested the Solong’s captain on suspicion of gross negligence manslaughter after a crew member went missing.Experts warn that jet fuel is highly toxic to marine life, with potential long-term ecological consequences.Key quote:“The health and environmental effects will be short- and long-term, local and regional.”— Dr. Jennifer Allan, Cardiff UniversityWhy this matters:Jet fuel spills can have severe consequences for marine ecosystems, harming fish, birds, and coastal habitats. Unlike crude oil, jet fuel evaporates quickly but is more acutely toxic, potentially disrupting food chains and contaminating fisheries. The North Sea supports diverse marine life and a significant fishing industry, making this spill particularly concerning. Investigations will determine the full extent of the damage, but containment efforts are already underway.Related: Oil pollution in UK seas underreported by nearly half, warns Oceana

Authorities arrested the captain of the cargo ship Solong after a fatal North Sea collision led to a jet fuel spill, raising alarms about marine pollution.Robyn Vinter, Josh Halliday, and Karen McVeigh report for The Guardian.In short:The Solong collided with the Stena Immaculate, which was carrying 220,000 barrels of jet fuel for the U.S. Air Force; at least one tank is leaking into the North Sea.Authorities arrested the Solong’s captain on suspicion of gross negligence manslaughter after a crew member went missing.Experts warn that jet fuel is highly toxic to marine life, with potential long-term ecological consequences.Key quote:“The health and environmental effects will be short- and long-term, local and regional.”— Dr. Jennifer Allan, Cardiff UniversityWhy this matters:Jet fuel spills can have severe consequences for marine ecosystems, harming fish, birds, and coastal habitats. Unlike crude oil, jet fuel evaporates quickly but is more acutely toxic, potentially disrupting food chains and contaminating fisheries. The North Sea supports diverse marine life and a significant fishing industry, making this spill particularly concerning. Investigations will determine the full extent of the damage, but containment efforts are already underway.Related: Oil pollution in UK seas underreported by nearly half, warns Oceana

Food
Health
Pollution

An open letter from EPA staff to the American public

Editor’s note: This op-ed was written by a group of current and former employees of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), who have asked to remain anonymous due to concerns about retaliation.The Trump administration is making accusations of fraud, waste, and abuse associated with federal environmental justice programs under the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) as justification for firing federal workers and defunding critical environmental programs. But the real waste, fraud, and abuse would be to strip away these funds from the American people.As current and former employees at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) who developed and implemented the agency’s environmental justice funding and grant programs, we want to offer our first-hand insights about the efficiency and importance of this work. This is not about defending our paychecks. This is about protecting the health of our communities.IRA funding is often described as a “once-in-a-generation investment,” putting billions of dollars toward improving the lives of American families in red, blue, and purple states. Working with communities, we’ve been placing these resources directly into their hands, supporting people to better protect the air we breathe, the water we drink, and the land where we live, learn, work, play, and grow — including key protections from natural disasters. As civil servants, we took an oath to protect and invest in the American public. We are committed to providing effective programs and being responsible stewards of taxpayer dollars, and there are many policies in place to ensure our accountability. But despite our careful planning and oversight, the new administration is halting programs Americans depend on for their health and wellbeing. We should work together to demand that the Trump administration restore this critical funding back to the people.The risks of losing a once-in-a-generation investmentThe Bush administration introduced environmental equity (and justice) programming to the EPA in the 1990s. EPA staff working on environmental justice programs partnered with communities to meet their needs and used rigorous systems to track funds and results.The Trump administration recently paused many of these environmental justice programs that fund community-led projects like air, water, and soil testing; training and workforce development; construction or cleanup projects; gardens and tree planting; and preparing and responding to natural disasters. Other examples of the EPA’s environmental justice programs include providing safe shelters during and after hurricanes, land cleanups to reduce communities’ exposure to harmful pollutants, and providing water filters to protect residents from lead in drinking water.This administration has halted funds, claiming “the objectives of the awards are no longer consistent with EPA funding priorities.” In reality, these funds were approved by Congress, and these grants remain in alignment with the agency’s mission to protect human health and the environment. Even though there are court orders to unfreeze billions of dollars in federal grants, the Trump administration continues to withhold this critical money from the people who need it most.We cannot stand by and allow this to happen. We need to hold this administration accountable to serving the American people, applying the same mandates that we have held our federal workforce and grant recipients to: follow the law, follow the science, and be transparent.Terminating the EPA’s environmental justice programs is hurting our communities and the economySome grant recipients who have lost access to EPA funding had already been working for more than a year on projects that must now be paused. Many recipients have hired local employees and made commitments in their communities.Now that funds are being pulled back, these organizations have had to lay off staff, pause local contracts with private companies and small businesses, and shut down community-driven projects. These attacks will impact the integrity of programs funded by our hard-earned tax dollars and take money away from communities across the country.By withholding promised funding and terminating existing contracts, the Trump administration is exposing the EPA to increased risks of litigation. Relationships that were built through years of meaningful engagement between communities and the federal government are being jeopardized. Organizations, institutions, and companies will likely shy away from future federal grant or contracting opportunities because no one wants to work with someone who doesn’t pay their bills and backs out on their promises.It is a waste of taxpayer dollars for the U.S. Government to cancel its agreements with grantees and contractors. It is fraud for the U.S. Government to delay payments for services already received. And it is an abuse of power for the Trump administration to block the IRA laws that were mandated by Congress.How to take action to restore funding to the American peopleIt can feel impossible to keep up with the news right now, but this story touches all of us. We should pay attention to what’s going on in our communities and find ways to stay engaged, like attending town halls to hear about the local impacts of federal policies and making your voice heard.If you are interested in advocating for the return of federal funding to the American people, we urge you to:Advocate for funding to be restored in your community. Take part in local town hall and other events in your area to advocate for federal funding to be returned to the people. Make your voice heard and claim your right to clean water, clean air, and a safe environment.Learn how the EPA’s environmental justice programs are investing in your state, city, or community. View this environmental justice grants map to see where IRA dollars and funding from the EPA’s environmental justice programs were invested.Learn how federal cuts are impacting your communities. View this Impact Map to read and share stories about how federal cuts are currently impacting your communities.Share on social media. Share our story or similar news stories on social media with #federalfundingfreeze, #federalcuts, or #truthtopower.Interested in republishing this piece? Please reach out and we'll be happy to help.

Editor’s note: This op-ed was written by a group of current and former employees of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), who have asked to remain anonymous due to concerns about retaliation.The Trump administration is making accusations of fraud, waste, and abuse associated with federal environmental justice programs under the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) as justification for firing federal workers and defunding critical environmental programs. But the real waste, fraud, and abuse would be to strip away these funds from the American people.As current and former employees at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) who developed and implemented the agency’s environmental justice funding and grant programs, we want to offer our first-hand insights about the efficiency and importance of this work. This is not about defending our paychecks. This is about protecting the health of our communities.IRA funding is often described as a “once-in-a-generation investment,” putting billions of dollars toward improving the lives of American families in red, blue, and purple states. Working with communities, we’ve been placing these resources directly into their hands, supporting people to better protect the air we breathe, the water we drink, and the land where we live, learn, work, play, and grow — including key protections from natural disasters. As civil servants, we took an oath to protect and invest in the American public. We are committed to providing effective programs and being responsible stewards of taxpayer dollars, and there are many policies in place to ensure our accountability. But despite our careful planning and oversight, the new administration is halting programs Americans depend on for their health and wellbeing. We should work together to demand that the Trump administration restore this critical funding back to the people.The risks of losing a once-in-a-generation investmentThe Bush administration introduced environmental equity (and justice) programming to the EPA in the 1990s. EPA staff working on environmental justice programs partnered with communities to meet their needs and used rigorous systems to track funds and results.The Trump administration recently paused many of these environmental justice programs that fund community-led projects like air, water, and soil testing; training and workforce development; construction or cleanup projects; gardens and tree planting; and preparing and responding to natural disasters. Other examples of the EPA’s environmental justice programs include providing safe shelters during and after hurricanes, land cleanups to reduce communities’ exposure to harmful pollutants, and providing water filters to protect residents from lead in drinking water.This administration has halted funds, claiming “the objectives of the awards are no longer consistent with EPA funding priorities.” In reality, these funds were approved by Congress, and these grants remain in alignment with the agency’s mission to protect human health and the environment. Even though there are court orders to unfreeze billions of dollars in federal grants, the Trump administration continues to withhold this critical money from the people who need it most.We cannot stand by and allow this to happen. We need to hold this administration accountable to serving the American people, applying the same mandates that we have held our federal workforce and grant recipients to: follow the law, follow the science, and be transparent.Terminating the EPA’s environmental justice programs is hurting our communities and the economySome grant recipients who have lost access to EPA funding had already been working for more than a year on projects that must now be paused. Many recipients have hired local employees and made commitments in their communities.Now that funds are being pulled back, these organizations have had to lay off staff, pause local contracts with private companies and small businesses, and shut down community-driven projects. These attacks will impact the integrity of programs funded by our hard-earned tax dollars and take money away from communities across the country.By withholding promised funding and terminating existing contracts, the Trump administration is exposing the EPA to increased risks of litigation. Relationships that were built through years of meaningful engagement between communities and the federal government are being jeopardized. Organizations, institutions, and companies will likely shy away from future federal grant or contracting opportunities because no one wants to work with someone who doesn’t pay their bills and backs out on their promises.It is a waste of taxpayer dollars for the U.S. Government to cancel its agreements with grantees and contractors. It is fraud for the U.S. Government to delay payments for services already received. And it is an abuse of power for the Trump administration to block the IRA laws that were mandated by Congress.How to take action to restore funding to the American peopleIt can feel impossible to keep up with the news right now, but this story touches all of us. We should pay attention to what’s going on in our communities and find ways to stay engaged, like attending town halls to hear about the local impacts of federal policies and making your voice heard.If you are interested in advocating for the return of federal funding to the American people, we urge you to:Advocate for funding to be restored in your community. Take part in local town hall and other events in your area to advocate for federal funding to be returned to the people. Make your voice heard and claim your right to clean water, clean air, and a safe environment.Learn how the EPA’s environmental justice programs are investing in your state, city, or community. View this environmental justice grants map to see where IRA dollars and funding from the EPA’s environmental justice programs were invested.Learn how federal cuts are impacting your communities. View this Impact Map to read and share stories about how federal cuts are currently impacting your communities.Share on social media. Share our story or similar news stories on social media with #federalfundingfreeze, #federalcuts, or #truthtopower.Interested in republishing this piece? Please reach out and we'll be happy to help.

Business
Government
Health

Community activists plead to be heard through “closed doors” outside nation’s top energy conference

HOUSTON — Climate activists expressed concern that discussions behind closed doors at the nation’s largest energy conference, CERAWeek by S&P Global, will further contribute to environmental health risks. As energy executives and political leaders across the nation convened for the conference in Houston, Texas this week to discuss the future of energy, representatives from the Gulf Coast, Rio Grande Valley, Ohio River Valley, and Cancer Alley highlighted the fossil fuel industry's impact in their communities. “It is our communities that are being harmed and hurt,” Yvette Arellano of the Houston environmental organization Fenceline Watch said. “It is our children that are having to play in playgrounds across the street from chemical plants and oil refineries.”Despite attempting to purchase conference tickets at costs of up to $10,500, activists have been barred from the conference in recent years, Arellano said.“The conference has shut out civil society from entering and understanding the projects that are coming to harm our communities,” Arellano said at a press conference at a park about 10 minutes from the convention center on Monday. “We demand transparency.” S&P Global has not responded to Environmental Health News’ request for comment. Health concerns and “energy additions”Some sessions at CERAWeek were devoted to climate discussions, like Monday’s session about climate change priorities featuring industry voices from S&P Global and the Oil and Gas Climate Initiative (OGCI), alongside environmental advocacy groups like the Environmental Defense Fund and the Energy Futures Initiative Foundation.The panel tackled questions about whether climate change will remain a priority for the industry and how the energy transition will continue under the Trump administration. Bob Dudley, chairman of the OGCI, repeatedly rephrased his own statements about the energy transition to “energy additions,” emphasizing the continued use of fossil fuels. “Oil and gas operators in the U.S. alone waste $3.5 billion worth of methane a year through leaks, flaring, and other releases, enough to supply the energy needs of 19 million American homes,” Fred Krupp, president of the Environmental Defense Fund, said in the same conference session. Less than a mile away from the CERAWeek convention, the Buffalo Bayou flows through downtown and into the Houston Ship Channel, which facilitates global access to the “energy capital of the world” for many of the companies in attendance at the conference. According to the Greater Houston Partnership, 44 of 128 publicly traded oil and gas companies and nearly one-third of the nation’s oil and gas jobs are located in Houston. With more than 600 petrochemical facilities, this single area produces about 42% of the nation's petrochemicals. Last year an Amnesty International report dubbed the area a “sacrifice zone,” where fenceline communities, predominantly populated by people of color, are exposed to disproportionately high levels of pollution. In these areas, chemical disasters, climate-warming emissions, and higher cancer risks are common. Several high-profile companies, including ExxonMobil, receive substantial tax breaks despite having poor environmental track records.“We have people who are over there who are making these decisions for our community,” said Breon Robinson, organizer for Southwest Louisiana and Southeast Texas at the environmental group Healthy Gulf, motioning toward the conference center. “They see us as scraps, they see us as a sacrifice zone … but we tell them hell no.”Protesters arrestedAfter the press conference, hundreds of protestors made their way toward a second public park just steps away from the CERAWeek convention center. Some held banners with messages like “No faith in fossil fuels” and “We need clean air, not another billionaire.” Others held cardboard cutouts or piñatas made in the likeness of oil and gas executives. Alexis Ramírez, Corpus Christi resident and elementary music teacher, played music during the march.Protesters arrestedAfter the press conference, hundreds of protestors made their way toward a second public park just steps away from the CERAWeek convention center. Some held banners with messages like “No faith in fossil fuels” and “We need clean air, not another billionaire.” Others held cardboard cutouts or piñatas made in the likeness of oil and gas executives. Alexis Ramírez, Corpus Christi resident and elementary music teacher, played music during the march.“I want to spread the joy of music and the power of music through this protest for my students,” Ramírez said. “They’re going to be our doctors, our teachers, whatever they are, they are going to take care of me and you when we are old. And that’s why I’m here, to take care of them.”The protest was escorted by dozens of police officers in vehicles and on horseback. As the protesters neared the convention center the group split in two as eight individuals interlocked arms briefly in front of traffic. After asking them to move and pressing forward with their horses, police officers arrested eight protesters, including Arellano of Fenceline Watch.While many groups said their concerns existed before the presidential administration change, some expressed worry that Trump’s policy shift toward “energy dominance” will further exacerbate environmental risks with promises of fast-tracked permitting processes and the repeal of pollution and climate rules.Despite these shifts, local activists are still calling for a just energy transition.“We get there together, or we never get there at all,” the protestors sang. “No one is getting left behind this time.”

HOUSTON — Climate activists expressed concern that discussions behind closed doors at the nation’s largest energy conference, CERAWeek by S&P Global, will further contribute to environmental health risks. As energy executives and political leaders across the nation convened for the conference in Houston, Texas this week to discuss the future of energy, representatives from the Gulf Coast, Rio Grande Valley, Ohio River Valley, and Cancer Alley highlighted the fossil fuel industry's impact in their communities. “It is our communities that are being harmed and hurt,” Yvette Arellano of the Houston environmental organization Fenceline Watch said. “It is our children that are having to play in playgrounds across the street from chemical plants and oil refineries.”Despite attempting to purchase conference tickets at costs of up to $10,500, activists have been barred from the conference in recent years, Arellano said.“The conference has shut out civil society from entering and understanding the projects that are coming to harm our communities,” Arellano said at a press conference at a park about 10 minutes from the convention center on Monday. “We demand transparency.” S&P Global has not responded to Environmental Health News’ request for comment. Health concerns and “energy additions”Some sessions at CERAWeek were devoted to climate discussions, like Monday’s session about climate change priorities featuring industry voices from S&P Global and the Oil and Gas Climate Initiative (OGCI), alongside environmental advocacy groups like the Environmental Defense Fund and the Energy Futures Initiative Foundation.The panel tackled questions about whether climate change will remain a priority for the industry and how the energy transition will continue under the Trump administration. Bob Dudley, chairman of the OGCI, repeatedly rephrased his own statements about the energy transition to “energy additions,” emphasizing the continued use of fossil fuels. “Oil and gas operators in the U.S. alone waste $3.5 billion worth of methane a year through leaks, flaring, and other releases, enough to supply the energy needs of 19 million American homes,” Fred Krupp, president of the Environmental Defense Fund, said in the same conference session. Less than a mile away from the CERAWeek convention, the Buffalo Bayou flows through downtown and into the Houston Ship Channel, which facilitates global access to the “energy capital of the world” for many of the companies in attendance at the conference. According to the Greater Houston Partnership, 44 of 128 publicly traded oil and gas companies and nearly one-third of the nation’s oil and gas jobs are located in Houston. With more than 600 petrochemical facilities, this single area produces about 42% of the nation's petrochemicals. Last year an Amnesty International report dubbed the area a “sacrifice zone,” where fenceline communities, predominantly populated by people of color, are exposed to disproportionately high levels of pollution. In these areas, chemical disasters, climate-warming emissions, and higher cancer risks are common. Several high-profile companies, including ExxonMobil, receive substantial tax breaks despite having poor environmental track records.“We have people who are over there who are making these decisions for our community,” said Breon Robinson, organizer for Southwest Louisiana and Southeast Texas at the environmental group Healthy Gulf, motioning toward the conference center. “They see us as scraps, they see us as a sacrifice zone … but we tell them hell no.”Protesters arrestedAfter the press conference, hundreds of protestors made their way toward a second public park just steps away from the CERAWeek convention center. Some held banners with messages like “No faith in fossil fuels” and “We need clean air, not another billionaire.” Others held cardboard cutouts or piñatas made in the likeness of oil and gas executives. Alexis Ramírez, Corpus Christi resident and elementary music teacher, played music during the march.Protesters arrestedAfter the press conference, hundreds of protestors made their way toward a second public park just steps away from the CERAWeek convention center. Some held banners with messages like “No faith in fossil fuels” and “We need clean air, not another billionaire.” Others held cardboard cutouts or piñatas made in the likeness of oil and gas executives. Alexis Ramírez, Corpus Christi resident and elementary music teacher, played music during the march.“I want to spread the joy of music and the power of music through this protest for my students,” Ramírez said. “They’re going to be our doctors, our teachers, whatever they are, they are going to take care of me and you when we are old. And that’s why I’m here, to take care of them.”The protest was escorted by dozens of police officers in vehicles and on horseback. As the protesters neared the convention center the group split in two as eight individuals interlocked arms briefly in front of traffic. After asking them to move and pressing forward with their horses, police officers arrested eight protesters, including Arellano of Fenceline Watch.While many groups said their concerns existed before the presidential administration change, some expressed worry that Trump’s policy shift toward “energy dominance” will further exacerbate environmental risks with promises of fast-tracked permitting processes and the repeal of pollution and climate rules.Despite these shifts, local activists are still calling for a just energy transition.“We get there together, or we never get there at all,” the protestors sang. “No one is getting left behind this time.”

Activism
Energy
Climate

What’s happening to EPA-funded community projects under Trump?

PITTSBURGH — The Biden administration pledged more than $53 million to community groups across the country for air monitoring projects in 2022, many of which were just getting underway when Trump took office. Trump issued executive orders that temporarily froze federal funding for environment-related projects (along with other key services and programs across the country), then fired and re-hired staff at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), which has caused confusion and delays in the implementation of key environmental health programs nationwide. The uncertainty has only been intensified by the news that the agency is repealing dozens of environmental regulations and plans to close all of its environmental justice offices. Programs facing a funding freeze included the 132 air monitoring projects in 37 states slated to receive $53.4 million in federal funding, which represent the agency’s largest investment in community air monitoring to date. Western Pennsylvania is one of a handful of geographic regions that received funding for multiple community air monitoring projects under the program. The region is home to numerous pollution sources that impact environmental health, including fracking, steel mills, petrochemical plants, and other industrial manufacturing. Exposure to this pollution increases the risk of cancer, heart and respiratory disease, premature death, and even mental illness. “I think there’s a misconception about abuse and waste of these federal funds that is so important to counter,” Ana Tsuhlares Hoffman, director of the air quality program at Carnegie Mellon University’s CREATE Lab, told EHN. The CREATE Lab is managing and analyzing the data collected from all of the federally-funded community air monitoring projects in western Pennsylvania. Organizations receiving federal funding, Hoffman said, need to be “open and up front about what we stand to lose if we lose this funding.” EHN spoke with Hoffman about how the Trump administration’s actions have impacted air monitoring projects in the region, and environmental health research and advocacy more broadly. Editor’s note: This conversation has been edited for length and clarity. EHN: What impacts on local environmental health research and advocacy have you seen from the federal funding freeze? Hoffman: We had four weeks of waking up not knowing if we’d be able to pay salaries for key staff or keep our promises to community members while our funds weren’t accessible and EPA staff were not allowed to communicate with us at all. It was a long, difficult process to administer the grants for the EPA’s community air monitoring projects. I’m so grateful to the nonprofits that took on this role — they’re all tiny compared to the organizations that usually receive federal funding, but they stepped up to figure out how to administer these grants on behalf of smaller grassroots organizations and individuals who’d been doing this work on their own for decades. Local nonprofits including FracTracker Alliance, Protect PT, GASP, and the Breathe Project worked together to decide who would represent different geographies and specific industrial polluters that had concerned residents for a long time. There was a lot of pressure to comply with the EPA requirements, which included a long list of quality assurance concerns we’d never encountered before. Securing those grants was hard-won and painful to achieve, but at the end of the process we felt like we’d leveled up our air monitoring capabilities in a meaningful way. We spent years getting to this place, and were just starting to collect air monitoring samples and process data when we learned about the funding freeze. It felt like years’ worth of activists’ and researchers’ time and effort was hanging in the balance. The big concern was whether we’d be able to pay people who were just hired to conduct new, federally-funded air monitoring projects, and whether we’d be able to keep the commitments that we’ve made to residents. That was a horrible moment where we had to go to residents to say, “We know we’ve been telling you for years that we’re working to get you answers about what you’re breathing next to this compression station or factory, but we’re not sure if we can follow through on that commitment.” EHN: What’s the status of those air monitoring projects now? Hoffman: As of right now, our grants have been un-suspended and reinstated, and we are able to access our funds, so we’re resuming the work. Our legal advisors have reminded us that we need to stay in compliance with our grant funds by continuing the work, even if it seems like there’s a chance the rug will be pulled out from under us. There’s a national network of federal funding recipients that’s facilitated by the Environmental Protection Network, which has been providing pro bono legal assistance to groups impacted by the federal funding freeze. They helped us organize instead of panicking, and groups across the country were able to successfully win back access to our funding by working in a coordinated way. Speaking as a university representative, there are labs like the CREATE Lab all across the country that serve local environmental research needs and are funded by federal dollars that are in much worse straits than we are. In cases like that, universities will have impossible decisions to make about whether to continue to support those initiatives as they lose funding for the administrative staff that keep universities running. EHN: How do you think Trump's rollbacks of environmental and health regulations could impact enforcement of those regulations at the federal, state, and local level? We’ve always had to use a combined effort of people power and legal support to effectively watchdog industrial polluters. But now we have less hope that our already significantly-underfunded agencies, like the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection, will be able to respond to concerns and conduct inspections in the way that they need to. There already aren’t enough investigators to come out when watchdogs produce evidence of pollution events that are worthy of investigation, and I do think enforcement is now being deprioritized. We’ll have to be more thoughtful and diligent in our data collection and evidence collection efforts. We’ll have to be systematic as best we can to try and help fill those gaps. EHN: How are environmental health advocates changing course to adapt to the new political landscape? I think we will have to adjust our hopes for engagement with the EPA. We’ll have to collectively change gears to hold polluters accountable as best we can while federal agencies lose access to the resources they need to properly enforce environmental regulations. We’ll have to accept that “energy dominance for America” means that any push to shift to a more sustainable and environmentally-friendly economy is going to be hampered, and that our hopes for building a better future will likely need to be put on pause while we focus on defending our previous progress. We’ll really need to work together. We all only have so many brain cells and so many hours in the day, but when we work collectively we’re much more powerful.

PITTSBURGH — The Biden administration pledged more than $53 million to community groups across the country for air monitoring projects in 2022, many of which were just getting underway when Trump took office. Trump issued executive orders that temporarily froze federal funding for environment-related projects (along with other key services and programs across the country), then fired and re-hired staff at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), which has caused confusion and delays in the implementation of key environmental health programs nationwide. The uncertainty has only been intensified by the news that the agency is repealing dozens of environmental regulations and plans to close all of its environmental justice offices. Programs facing a funding freeze included the 132 air monitoring projects in 37 states slated to receive $53.4 million in federal funding, which represent the agency’s largest investment in community air monitoring to date. Western Pennsylvania is one of a handful of geographic regions that received funding for multiple community air monitoring projects under the program. The region is home to numerous pollution sources that impact environmental health, including fracking, steel mills, petrochemical plants, and other industrial manufacturing. Exposure to this pollution increases the risk of cancer, heart and respiratory disease, premature death, and even mental illness. “I think there’s a misconception about abuse and waste of these federal funds that is so important to counter,” Ana Tsuhlares Hoffman, director of the air quality program at Carnegie Mellon University’s CREATE Lab, told EHN. The CREATE Lab is managing and analyzing the data collected from all of the federally-funded community air monitoring projects in western Pennsylvania. Organizations receiving federal funding, Hoffman said, need to be “open and up front about what we stand to lose if we lose this funding.” EHN spoke with Hoffman about how the Trump administration’s actions have impacted air monitoring projects in the region, and environmental health research and advocacy more broadly. Editor’s note: This conversation has been edited for length and clarity. EHN: What impacts on local environmental health research and advocacy have you seen from the federal funding freeze? Hoffman: We had four weeks of waking up not knowing if we’d be able to pay salaries for key staff or keep our promises to community members while our funds weren’t accessible and EPA staff were not allowed to communicate with us at all. It was a long, difficult process to administer the grants for the EPA’s community air monitoring projects. I’m so grateful to the nonprofits that took on this role — they’re all tiny compared to the organizations that usually receive federal funding, but they stepped up to figure out how to administer these grants on behalf of smaller grassroots organizations and individuals who’d been doing this work on their own for decades. Local nonprofits including FracTracker Alliance, Protect PT, GASP, and the Breathe Project worked together to decide who would represent different geographies and specific industrial polluters that had concerned residents for a long time. There was a lot of pressure to comply with the EPA requirements, which included a long list of quality assurance concerns we’d never encountered before. Securing those grants was hard-won and painful to achieve, but at the end of the process we felt like we’d leveled up our air monitoring capabilities in a meaningful way. We spent years getting to this place, and were just starting to collect air monitoring samples and process data when we learned about the funding freeze. It felt like years’ worth of activists’ and researchers’ time and effort was hanging in the balance. The big concern was whether we’d be able to pay people who were just hired to conduct new, federally-funded air monitoring projects, and whether we’d be able to keep the commitments that we’ve made to residents. That was a horrible moment where we had to go to residents to say, “We know we’ve been telling you for years that we’re working to get you answers about what you’re breathing next to this compression station or factory, but we’re not sure if we can follow through on that commitment.” EHN: What’s the status of those air monitoring projects now? Hoffman: As of right now, our grants have been un-suspended and reinstated, and we are able to access our funds, so we’re resuming the work. Our legal advisors have reminded us that we need to stay in compliance with our grant funds by continuing the work, even if it seems like there’s a chance the rug will be pulled out from under us. There’s a national network of federal funding recipients that’s facilitated by the Environmental Protection Network, which has been providing pro bono legal assistance to groups impacted by the federal funding freeze. They helped us organize instead of panicking, and groups across the country were able to successfully win back access to our funding by working in a coordinated way. Speaking as a university representative, there are labs like the CREATE Lab all across the country that serve local environmental research needs and are funded by federal dollars that are in much worse straits than we are. In cases like that, universities will have impossible decisions to make about whether to continue to support those initiatives as they lose funding for the administrative staff that keep universities running. EHN: How do you think Trump's rollbacks of environmental and health regulations could impact enforcement of those regulations at the federal, state, and local level? We’ve always had to use a combined effort of people power and legal support to effectively watchdog industrial polluters. But now we have less hope that our already significantly-underfunded agencies, like the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection, will be able to respond to concerns and conduct inspections in the way that they need to. There already aren’t enough investigators to come out when watchdogs produce evidence of pollution events that are worthy of investigation, and I do think enforcement is now being deprioritized. We’ll have to be more thoughtful and diligent in our data collection and evidence collection efforts. We’ll have to be systematic as best we can to try and help fill those gaps. EHN: How are environmental health advocates changing course to adapt to the new political landscape? I think we will have to adjust our hopes for engagement with the EPA. We’ll have to collectively change gears to hold polluters accountable as best we can while federal agencies lose access to the resources they need to properly enforce environmental regulations. We’ll have to accept that “energy dominance for America” means that any push to shift to a more sustainable and environmentally-friendly economy is going to be hampered, and that our hopes for building a better future will likely need to be put on pause while we focus on defending our previous progress. We’ll really need to work together. We all only have so many brain cells and so many hours in the day, but when we work collectively we’re much more powerful.

Activism
Chemicals
Energy

Opinion: I live in Flint, Michigan. Shuttering environmental justice at EPA hurts communities like mine.

Eleven years ago Flint, Michigan, fatefully switched its drinking water supply to the Flint River. The consequences are well-documented: significant damage to pipes, a historic outbreak of Legionnaires’ disease, system-wide lead contamination. My then-three-year-old son was one of the children who drank that lead-tainted water. Because lead is only detectable in the blood for two months’ time, we, like many other Flint families, will never know exactly how much lead may have entered our child’s body, or what effects it might have had on his development. That uncertainty is just one of the many ways in which the Flint water crisis continues to reverberate throughout our community.Another notable, and much-remarked reverberation is the effect the crisis had on trust in governmental institutions. Flint parents will not soon forget the many months our children drank tainted water while officials insisted everything was fine. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), for its part, was shamefully slow to act in the face of evidence that the water posed an imminent threat. In some ways, the agency is still on the wrong side of the crisis, as it continues to fight a lawsuit brought by residents. But EPA has given itself a means of addressing its blind spots, course correcting, and hopefully, minimizing mistakes like the ones we saw in Flint.The EPA’s National Environmental Justice Advisory Council (NEJAC) was created in 1993 to provide recommendations to the EPA administrator for addressing pollution and other environmental burdens in our hardest-hit communities. NEJAC’s members are unpaid, performing their work for the council as a public service. And they hail from a wide range of backgrounds: community-based organizations, state and local government, academia, tribal government, and the business and industry sector. Credit: SHTTEFAN on Unsplash NEJAC’s open meetings offer the public inlets of influence over the federal government, giving communities the opportunity to lift up their concerns and ensure that they are taken seriously and followed up on. After the revelations about Flint’s water, NEJAC invited one of the city’s leading water activists to speak to the council and, inspired by her testimony and reports from other community advocates, authored a letter calling for prompt EPA action to address “enduring problems” in Flint. (The agency’s follow-up actions are detailed here.) Subsequently, Flint helped to inspire NEJAC’s national recommendations around water infrastructure.In 2020, the last year of the first Trump administration, I began my own service on NEJAC. That year, former EPA Administrator Andrew Wheeler conducted a review of all advisory committees to EPA and, in his words, “reaffirmed the importance” of NEJAC’s “critical role” in helping the agency “make measurable progress improving the health and welfare of overburdened communities.”The difference between then and now is striking. Current EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin has suggested that environmental justice work amounts to discrimination and has been purging EPA of all traces of its environmental justice commitments. Notably, NEJAC has been removed from EPA’s official list of advisory committees, and the fate of the council is unclear. As (presumptive) NEJAC vice-chair, I and other members of the NEJAC leadership team sent a letter to Administrator Zeldin on February 28 asking him to meet with us, as is customary for a new administrator. He has not responded.Meanwhile, like other marginalized communities, Flint waits to see whether our plight will be taken seriously by this administration. Flint remains under the EPA emergency order issued in January 2016, a reflection of our water system’s lingering issues. While significant strides have been made in getting lead out of our water, residents are awaiting the completion of lead pipe removal, and we still face many challenges in rebuilding the relationship between residents and our water utility. Under the last presidential administration, EPA employees in the environmental justice program offered resources to help facilitate the Flint Water System Advisory Council, which serves as an interface between Flint residents and the city’s water managers. Whether this support will continue, given that some of these agency allies have been placed on administrative leave and are facing termination, is very much an open question. On February 20 of this year, Administrator Zeldin made a point of visiting Flint. He toured the Flint Water Treatment Plant and pledged that EPA would remain “fully engaged” with the city’s recovery effort. What the administrator did not do, however, is take the time to hear directly from impacted community members about their needs, concerns, and recommendations.It is a contradiction to claim full engagement and to simultaneously neglect or cut off opportunities for members of our most marginalized communities to lift up their voices to EPA and other federal agencies. With the closing of EPA’s national and regional environmental justice offices, there has never been more need for the spotlight that NEJAC can shine on the environmental struggles of communities like Flint. For over 30 years, across Democratic and Republican administrations, NEJAC has provided EPA decision-makers with invaluable perspective at negligible cost to the American taxpayer. Administrator Zeldin should, like his predecessors, reaffirm its important role.

Eleven years ago Flint, Michigan, fatefully switched its drinking water supply to the Flint River. The consequences are well-documented: significant damage to pipes, a historic outbreak of Legionnaires’ disease, system-wide lead contamination. My then-three-year-old son was one of the children who drank that lead-tainted water. Because lead is only detectable in the blood for two months’ time, we, like many other Flint families, will never know exactly how much lead may have entered our child’s body, or what effects it might have had on his development. That uncertainty is just one of the many ways in which the Flint water crisis continues to reverberate throughout our community.Another notable, and much-remarked reverberation is the effect the crisis had on trust in governmental institutions. Flint parents will not soon forget the many months our children drank tainted water while officials insisted everything was fine. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), for its part, was shamefully slow to act in the face of evidence that the water posed an imminent threat. In some ways, the agency is still on the wrong side of the crisis, as it continues to fight a lawsuit brought by residents. But EPA has given itself a means of addressing its blind spots, course correcting, and hopefully, minimizing mistakes like the ones we saw in Flint.The EPA’s National Environmental Justice Advisory Council (NEJAC) was created in 1993 to provide recommendations to the EPA administrator for addressing pollution and other environmental burdens in our hardest-hit communities. NEJAC’s members are unpaid, performing their work for the council as a public service. And they hail from a wide range of backgrounds: community-based organizations, state and local government, academia, tribal government, and the business and industry sector. Credit: SHTTEFAN on Unsplash NEJAC’s open meetings offer the public inlets of influence over the federal government, giving communities the opportunity to lift up their concerns and ensure that they are taken seriously and followed up on. After the revelations about Flint’s water, NEJAC invited one of the city’s leading water activists to speak to the council and, inspired by her testimony and reports from other community advocates, authored a letter calling for prompt EPA action to address “enduring problems” in Flint. (The agency’s follow-up actions are detailed here.) Subsequently, Flint helped to inspire NEJAC’s national recommendations around water infrastructure.In 2020, the last year of the first Trump administration, I began my own service on NEJAC. That year, former EPA Administrator Andrew Wheeler conducted a review of all advisory committees to EPA and, in his words, “reaffirmed the importance” of NEJAC’s “critical role” in helping the agency “make measurable progress improving the health and welfare of overburdened communities.”The difference between then and now is striking. Current EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin has suggested that environmental justice work amounts to discrimination and has been purging EPA of all traces of its environmental justice commitments. Notably, NEJAC has been removed from EPA’s official list of advisory committees, and the fate of the council is unclear. As (presumptive) NEJAC vice-chair, I and other members of the NEJAC leadership team sent a letter to Administrator Zeldin on February 28 asking him to meet with us, as is customary for a new administrator. He has not responded.Meanwhile, like other marginalized communities, Flint waits to see whether our plight will be taken seriously by this administration. Flint remains under the EPA emergency order issued in January 2016, a reflection of our water system’s lingering issues. While significant strides have been made in getting lead out of our water, residents are awaiting the completion of lead pipe removal, and we still face many challenges in rebuilding the relationship between residents and our water utility. Under the last presidential administration, EPA employees in the environmental justice program offered resources to help facilitate the Flint Water System Advisory Council, which serves as an interface between Flint residents and the city’s water managers. Whether this support will continue, given that some of these agency allies have been placed on administrative leave and are facing termination, is very much an open question. On February 20 of this year, Administrator Zeldin made a point of visiting Flint. He toured the Flint Water Treatment Plant and pledged that EPA would remain “fully engaged” with the city’s recovery effort. What the administrator did not do, however, is take the time to hear directly from impacted community members about their needs, concerns, and recommendations.It is a contradiction to claim full engagement and to simultaneously neglect or cut off opportunities for members of our most marginalized communities to lift up their voices to EPA and other federal agencies. With the closing of EPA’s national and regional environmental justice offices, there has never been more need for the spotlight that NEJAC can shine on the environmental struggles of communities like Flint. For over 30 years, across Democratic and Republican administrations, NEJAC has provided EPA decision-makers with invaluable perspective at negligible cost to the American taxpayer. Administrator Zeldin should, like his predecessors, reaffirm its important role.

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